elinks
Browse websites in a text-based environment
TLDR
Start ELinks
Quit elinks
Dump output of webpage to console, colorizing the text with ANSI control codes
SYNOPSIS
elinks [options] [URL]
PARAMETERS
-a, --anonymous
Anonymous mode: disables most history and caches
-auto-submit
Auto-submit first form on page
-base-url
Base URL for relative links
-dump
Dump formatted page to stdout
-dump-charset
Charset for -dump output
-format
Dump format: formatted, dump, html, source, ps, pdf
-h, --help
Display help and exit
-no-connect-tags
Don't turn taglists into menus
-no-numbering
Disable link numbering
-no-references
Omit reference markers in dump
-restrict
Restrict dangerous features (safe, safeish, full)
-session
Load session from file
-suspend-after
Suspend process after loading page
-timeout
Network timeout in seconds
-verbose
Verbose logging
-version
Display version info
DESCRIPTION
ELinks is a feature-rich, open-source text-based web browser designed for use in Linux terminals and consoles. It supports modern web protocols including HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, Finger, and NNTP, with advanced rendering of HTML 4.0, CSS, and tables. Key features include tabbed browsing, frame support, bookmark management, search engines, and scripting via Lua or ECMAScript. It offers mouse support in Xterm-like terminals, download management, and customizable keybindings. ELinks is lightweight, fast, and highly configurable through its elinks.conf file, making it ideal for remote SSH sessions, embedded systems, or users preferring keyboard-driven navigation over graphical browsers. It excels at viewing man pages, downloading files, and browsing without JavaScript-heavy sites, though full JS support requires additional modules.
CAVEATS
Limited JavaScript support without modules; no image rendering; may struggle with heavy CSS/JS sites; requires elinks.conf for full customization.
SCRIPTING
Supports Lua and ECMAScript for extensions; enable with --with-lua or --with-smjs at compile.
CONFIGURATION
Edit ~/.elinks/elinks.conf for keybindings, colors, and options; use elinks -bl to regenerate.
HISTORY
Forked from Links 1.00pre28 in 2004 by Petr Baudis as 'Links-hacked'. Renamed ELinks, actively developed until ~2010, with focus on scripting (Lua/ECMAScript) and tabs. Maintained sporadically since, available in most distros.
